1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a substantially dry, disposable foamable wipe article with physical features allowing for improved manufacture. The article is especially useful for personal cleansing and conditioning of skin or hair.
2. The Related Art
Traditional personal cleansing vehicles have been in the form of gels, bars and pourable liquid products. These forms are highly effective for cleansing purposes. Nevertheless, they are somewhat boring and, indeed, have some deficiencies. Often consumers combine the cleaning chemicals delivered by gels, bars and liquids with a wash cloth. Advantages of a cloth include improved spreadability, abrasive action and a pleasant ergonomic handfeel. Realization of such advantages for combining cleansing chemicals with a wipe have led to a rather large body of technology.
Among the most recent additions are a series of disclosures concerning substantially dry, disposable personal cleansing products activated upon use by wetting. Illustrative is U.S. Pat. No. 5,972,361 (Fowler et al.) disclosing a disposable, single use personal care cleansing and conditioning product wherein a lathering surfactant and oil soluble conditioning agent are during manufacture each separately applied to a substrate. Similar disclosures are found in U.S. Pat. No. 6,074,655 (Fowler et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 5,951,991 (Wagner et al.) and U.S. Pat. No. 6,132,746 (Hasenoehrl et al.).
U.S. Pat. No. 5,952,043 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,863,663, both to Mackey et al., describe typical procedures for manufacture of dry wipes. Application of the chemicals to the substrate is reported to be either through spraying, rotogravure coating or by screen printing. Coatings are simply applied to either or both surfaces of the substrate. FIG. 2 describes a system where the substrate passes between a pair of presses thereby simultaneously coating each surface of the substrate. Amounts of transferred surfactant or conditioning emulsion is reported to be controlled by either of two general adjustments. One of these is by control of the width of the nip area between the contact cylinders or other nip areas of the presses. The second general manner of adjustments is achieved through a change in the relief (valley depth) or print pattern on the areas of the cylinders contacting the substrate.
Among problems associated with the process is selectivity of deposition, especially where different amounts and patterns of chemicals must be deposited on opposite sides of the substrate web. In particular, it may be desirable to produce a wipe where one surface bears a major amount of cleansing chemicals and the opposite surface is limited to a much smaller amount, but the latter being deposited in defined areas. Articles of this type have the advantage that, with the aid of cues, the consumer will wet the chemically heavier deposited side and obtain instantly a richer foam. On the other hand, for those consumers who have missed the cue, there still will be a small amount of foam generated on the side not intended for cleansing.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a disposable, substantially dry cleansing product which includes a wiping substrate and a foamable composition wherein a major portion of the composition is applied onto one side of the wiping substrate and a minor portion on the other.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a disposable, substantially dry cleansing product formed as flexible wiping cloth, with one surface of the wiping cloth having a different surface topography and a different amount of composition deposited thereon than an opposite second surface.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a method for producing a disposable, substantially dry cleansing product in a process which readily allows coating of juxtaposed opposite surfaces of a wiping substrate but requiring application of the foamable composition to only a first of those surfaces.
A substantially dry cleansing product is provided which includes:
(i) a water insoluble substrate defined by juxtaposed first and second major surfaces, the first major surface being formed with a plurality of upwardly projecting moguls spaced apart from one another; and
(ii) a foamable composition including a lathering surfactant wherein more of the composition is deposited on the second major surface than on the first major surface of the substrate
Also provided is a method for producing a cleansing article which includes an apertured water-insoluble substrate having first and second major surfaces opposite one another, the first major surface being formed with a plurality of spaced apart moguls, and the article delivering a foamable composition including a lathering surfactant, the method including:
feeding the substrate onto a guide roller, the first major surface of the substrate being juxtaposed against a surface of the guide roller;
applying the foamable composition to the second major surface of the substrate while the first major surface remains juxtaposed against the guide roller; and
allowing a minor amount of the applied foamable composition to transfer through the apertured substrate from the second to the first major surface.